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JP’s BIOGRAPHY

Dr. Jianping (JP) Xu attended Jiangxi and Nanjing Agricultural Universities, where he obtained his B.Sc. in 1985 and M.Sc. in 1988. After working for a few years in China, he furthered his graduate studies at the University of Toronto, where he obtained another M.Sc. in 1993 and his Ph.D. in 1997, working with Dr. James Anderson, on the genetic structure of natural populations of the button mushroom Agaricus bisporus. In 2000, Dr. Xu completed post-doctoral training at
Duke University and joined McMaster University as an assistant professor in the Department of Biology. Over the years, his lab has enjoyed close collaborations with researchers both within and outside of Canada. He is currently a tenured full professor where he teaches microbiology, genetics, field ecology, and evolution at the undergraduate, graduate, and post-graduate levels. His research interest include: molecular ecology, genetics, molecular biology, medical mycology, population biology, genomics, mushroomology, conservation biology, microbial ecology, and molecular epidemiology. He has published broadly in national and international peer reviewed scientific journals. He currently serves on the editorial board of Acta Edulis Fungi (Board Member), Genome (Associate Editor), Mycology (Associate Editor), Mycopathologia (Associate Editor), and Mycoses (Associate editor). He sits on several committees within and outside of McMaster University. He is the Associate Chair of Biology (Graduate Studies) and a member of McMaster University Biosafety Committee. Dr. Xu has been the
recipient of diverse grants and awards, including the Young Scientist Award of the Genetics Society of Canada.

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When he is not doing science, he race walks. He has won several races and holds a few age-group national records. His fastest time in the 10K race walk stands at 49:40 (Penn Relays, USA, 2014), in the 5K category his record to beat is 23:58 (Athletics Ontario Championship, Canada, 2013). He runs occasionally, attending the 100th Boston Marathon in 1996. In 2013, he ran the Shanghai International Marathon in a chip-time of 2:56:06.